Drive-by Meet and Greet

The rogue WiFi signal coming from the Day’s Inn was booming that night.  I was laying on the bed of my camper taking advantage of the normally fickle signal.  Relaxed by a half a bottle of cheap pinot noir and a wad of Grizzly straight chewing tobacco that delivered warm nicotine from my gums directly to my heart then back to my brain.  That’s when I heard, “bang, bang-bang bang, bang, bang-bang!  Anyone else would have been surprised, would have known, not me.  I thought the shots were fire crackers.  You see, I was new to Chula Vista.  In Oaxaca, Mexico, where I came from, where I had been living for the past year and a half, rude explosions throughout the night were the norm.  In Mexico there is no such thing as a city ordinance against noise, or fire crackers-and let me tell you, Mexicans take advantage of that fact.  It wasn’t until I saw the blue lights bouncing off the walls of my camper and heard the sirens that I realized those crisp explosions were gun shots.
 
    I jumped into my dirty jeans and slipped on my fake crocs to go outside and investigate.  I walked through the trailer park, Fogerty Brothers trailer park on Broadway and E street towards the blue lights.  My neighbors were already gathered together on Broadway gossiping and pointing, a motley crew.  As I found out that night, nothing brings a trailer park together like a drive by shooting.  There were about seven cop cars lined up across Broadway, in front of a Mexican restaurant, their lights were flashing like blinding blue lightening.
“What happened?” I asked Bruce, the boyfriend of the Park’s manager, Michelle.
“Just a drive by,” Bruce said with his normal grin.
“Anyone hit?” I asked trying to be as nonchalant as him, a longtime veteran of Chula Vista and the trailer park.
“Nope, I think they tagged that Explorer though, I think I see some holes in the side panel there.”
Embolden by the pinot noir, I left my pack of neighbors and headed closer to see if I could get substantiated information.  I stopped about ten feet from the supposedly wounded Ford Explorer.  I couldn’t see any holes in it at all but a man was lying in the back seat and a cop was scribbling on his clip-boards.  I asked one of the cops what happened.  He ignored me.
“Can’t tell me anything, huh, ongoing investigation?” I asked.
He nodded, and walked away from me.
I walked back to my group of neighbors and they all wanted to know what information the cop gave me.  I was an anomaly, nobody had even considered walking up to the cops to ask what happened, a lot of the people in the park have good reason to stay far away from the police, but I have nothing to worry about, I have never been caught.
We all stood gathered together and I shook hands and introduced myself to some of the neighbors that I still hadn’t met.  The drive-by was like a meet and greet.  Stories were recounted of past drive-by shootings and the party lasted about half an hour, the blue strobe lights were still gleaming when I said goodnight and headed back to the camper, the rouge WiFi, my pinot noir and Grizzly straight.